


Smoke Gets in Your Eyes (version 1)

by Sloane



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: (OG Elias was aware of everything his body was used for... everything), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Drinking to Cope, Heavy Drinking, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, No beta we die like archival assistants, OG Elias and Jon Role Swap (Archivist Elias & Head of Institute Jon), Panic Attacks, Past Rape/Non-con, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-04
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:22:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26277109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sloane/pseuds/Sloane
Summary: Thanks to the interference of a jilted lover, one whose bones were kept as an office decoration for centuries, Jonah Magnus is no more. Only Elias Bouchard remains, complete with the old man’s eyes.Beholding quickly chooses a new Favorite. It’s not the traumatized former file clerk, it’s Jonathan Sims—who’s barely had time to settle into the role of Head Archivist before his supernatural promotion.They’re both just going to have to deal with it.(Version 1 and Discontinued)
Relationships: Original Elias Bouchard/Michael Shelley
Comments: 23
Kudos: 117





	1. Being Elias Bouchard

**Author's Note:**

> A semi-sequel to [this fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25078135), except in this case it happens very early in season one—before things start to get wormy.
> 
> Massive series spoilers abound, granted.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Elias is free. Sort of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CONTENT WARNINGS  
> -Reference to Past Non-Con & Murder 
> 
> There’s brief mention of past use of Elias’s body without his consent, both for purposes of sex and murder.

Elias sits in his office—no, not his office, _Jonah Magnus’s_ office—and tries to breathe.

Funny how it goes. Decades spent with no control over his body, and the first thing he gets to do is endure a panic attack. That was what the bloody weed used to be for, because no doctor in the eighties and nineties believed a bloke who ‘had it all’ could also have anxiety for some fucking reason—and if ever he needed something to take the edge off, now was the goddamn time. 

Yeah, whatever, self-medicating was unhealthy, he knew that, but he just spent the better part of twenty years trapped inside his own head, watching Jonah... Nope. Elias can’t even think about it.

He pulls at ‘his’ silk tie. It makes him feel like he’s choking. The gaudy eye-shaped pin on it comes loose and clatters to the floor, forgotten the moment it’s out of sight.

Breathe. Focus on counting. Stare at the sodding ink blotter Elias used to fixate on whenever Jonah’s eyes passed that way, because who seriously still needs an ink blotter in this day and age? Posh twats with delusions of grandeur, that’s who. Elias picks it up, because he can finally do that now. It’s old, definitely an antique—like a lot of stuff in the office—and lobs it across the room.

It feels good to be back in control of his own body, even if his inaugural actions are childish. What annoys him more than anything is that it was impossible to be imprisoned in the back of his own head, always staring out, without picking up a lot of second-hand knowledge from Jonah Fucking Magnus. Take ‘inaugural action,’ for instance. No way the old Elias—i.e. him, the real one—would ever fucking say that. Gertrude and the old school crew liked that he was a bloodhound for files, a ‘savant’ as they put it—which he now knows was an insult, those bastards—and that was about it. James Wright AKA Jonah “Ooh-Don’t-Let Terminus-Get-Me” Magnus liked Elias’s hot bod, and subsequently ruined the best years of his life.

God, he’s so fucking old now. Okay, middle-aged, but still. Twenty years gone. Poof. No easy cruising like this without getting called a creep. Elias cradles his head in his hands. While he’s at it, he messes up his hair as much as he can. It‘s a hard-won fight against the awful pomade shit Jonah used, but he’s fine with looking disheveled and a little unhinged for now. It fits.

Christ, he feels like an entire dictionary was shoved inside his head along with all the extra information about the Fears he could really do without. But whatever, an improved vocabulary didn’t automatically make him a posh asshole. Nor did second-hand knowledge of the forbidden—what an eye rolling, heh, word for it—make him anything like Jonah Magnus and friends.

The real question is if Jonah used his hands to commit murder, did it make Elias equally guilty? Or is he as much an unwitting tool as a knife or shotgun?

Yeah, that’s what he was—a tool.

Elias chokes back an hysterical laugh.

Turns out he picked up a lot of trauma with all that unwanted knowledge, kind of like auditing a uni course where the professor occasionally hard fucked his rival/patron atop his own bloody desk while Elias had no choice but to watch—the desk Elias is still sitting at, by the way.

He needs out of this office. He needs out of these clothes. A long, hot shower where he can sob in peace sounds like a good start. The trick is sneaking out of the Institute without running into of anyone else.

Elias starts by sending an e-mail to everyone stating he’s going to be taking some personal time. Copying Jonah’s manner of speech is easy. He’s passively watched him write countless memos before, after all. Elias hates carrying on the ruse when all he really wants to do is write ‘I’m out, suck it.’ Maybe with a little smiley face.

A horrible feeling of dread curls in his gut when Elias remembers Peter Lukas is included in that ‘all’ chain. But Peter rarely checks his e-mail, text messages, voicemail or anything. Elias has time. If he stays busy, he can keep from thinking about all the things Jonah used his body for with Peter. He’s more than a little horrified to find himself getting aroused as one of their more recent encounters comes to mind, but the thought of standing over Gertrude Robinson with a shotgun nips that in the bud right quick.

Elias exhales a shaky sigh of relief, glad he’s not quite _that_ fucked up after all these years, only now he feels sick remembering the way her chest looked after it was all over.

 _Focus_.

He needs to get away from this damn building and all the awful things that occurred in, around, and beneath it. Elias stands up and pauses at the door to the office.

He really should’ve thought about his exit strategy before messing up his hair, so he’ll just have to take the back stairs, otherwise Rosie will have questions. He pulls off his tie completely as he winds through the stairwell, unbuttons the top few buttons of his shirt, and shucks off the tailored suit jacket that’s starting to feel more like a straight jacket. He’s just finished rolling up his sleeves when the door to the Archives level suddenly bursts open and two out of three of Jon’s assistants burst out.

“There he is!” Sasha yells. “Get him!”

They’re a level below him and Elias is halfway down the steps, so he has a chance. He throws the very expensive suit coat at them as a distraction and runs for it. Tim bounds up the steps two at a time—oh, right, he’s quite athletic—and tackles Elias on the landing. Elias is incredibly lucky he lands just shy of the next fight, otherwise he might have cracked his head open. Or maybe he’s not so lucky, the jury’s still out.

“Come on!” Elias wails. “I just want out!”

“Oi, be gentle,” Sasha chides. “That’s not really... I mean, it _is_ Elias, but he’s the original.”

Elias looks up at Tim, and something in his eyes makes him relent. Tim helps Elias up, but still keeps a firm grip on his arm.

“How did you know?” Elias asks.

Sasha looks grim. “You’d better come and see.”

It clicks the instant they start leading him down to the Archives.

“Oh no.”

“Oh, yes,” Tim says. “Jon said something about you and Jonah Magnus right before he was... overwhelmed, I guess you’d say.”

“Look, I’m sorry,” Elias says. “But something weird happened. One of Jonah Magnus’s enemies, or lovers, or both... I’m not sure what they did to him, but he’s gone.”

“Martin is still with Jon,” Sasha says. “Whatever happened, it blew back on him in a bad way.”

“And if something happened while we were gone...” Tim trails off, the threat implied.

“Hey, whoa, I had nothing to do with any of this!” Elias says desperately. “Up until a few minutes ago I was a prisoner in my own head!”

Sasha boggles at him. “So you were aware of everything that was happening?”

“The entire time?!” Tim exclaims, squeezing Elias’s arm. Hard to tell if it’s anger or horror. Maybe both.

Elias recoils. “I _told_ you, I couldn’t do anything!”

“No, no,” Tim says, letting go of his arm at last, but Elias is still stuck between Tim and Sasha in the narrow halls of the Archives. “I believe you. It’s just...” He rubs his forehead. “That’s incredibly fucked up, man.”

“You’re telling me...”

“Would you say it was similar to the end of Being John Malkovich?” Sasha asks. “You know, the movie?”

“With John Malkovich,” Tim wryly adds.

“Never saw it.” Elias sighs. “Bastard only watched boring art house films.”

“Sounds about right.” Tim laughs before lapsing into a comically posh accent. “Only the _finest_ of cinema will do for Mr. B—oh, wait, sorry.”

“Excuse you, Elias Bouchard likes Die Hard 1-3, and from what I’ve gathered I guess it’s a good thing I never got dragged to see the latest one.”

“I’m really not sober enough for this conversation,” Sasha groans, massaging her temples to ward off an oncoming headache as she walks ahead of them through the stacks.

“Yeah?” Elias retorts. “How do you think I feel?”

The door to the Head Archivist’s room opens just as they’re approaching. Martin rushes out, looking frazzled. He stumbles to a halt as he sees Sasha.

“I wasn’t abandoning him!” He cries. “He’s not responding to anything and I just feel so useless, so... I thought maybe I’d make some tea.”

Elias peers around Sasha to see Martin staring at the floor and fumbling with the hem of his jumper. Sasha moves forward to hug Martin, who starts sobbing the moment her arms are around him. 

As Elias looks for a way to escape once more, a hand comes down on his shoulder from behind. Tim again. Elias shrugs it off and turns.

“What can I possibly do?” He hisses in a whisper. “Jonah Magnus is _gone_. I’m just his abandoned, broken down old sports car.”

Tim’s expression softens a little. “Look, don’t take this as a come on, because it’s not, and I would never admit this if Jimmy Magma was still around, but... you _do_ look good for your age.”

Elias blushes and looks away. “It’s probably all thanks to the face cream made of pig’s placentas he used.”

“The _what?!”_ Tim shouts.

Martin’s weeping stops abruptly.

Elias turns back around slowly. Martin and Sasha are staring. 

“Never mind!” Tim says, as if that will help.

Martin sniffles with as much dignity as he can muster. “I’m going to go make that tea.”

Getting to the break room means skirting past Elias first. Martin tenses, his hands balling into fists. “Oh. Right. I’m guessing re-introductions aren’t actually necessary, are they?”

Elias shakes his head, flattening himself against the wall so he can pass. Martin looks confused by this. Elias gets it. They’re still expecting Jonah Magnus mind games—the holding eye contact and smiling until the other person blinks, the ‘forgetting’ he’s standing in the way until they’re forced to say something, but he’s gone and that’s never happening again. Elias just wants to go home.

But ‘home’ is that awful magazine spread townhouse of Jonah’s, not the cozy little flat he used to call home, so maybe it behooves him to hang around the Archives crew a bit longer—at least until they get Jon squared away.

“Wow,” Sasha remarks once Martin passes. “You really are nothing like him. It’s... refreshing.”

Elias sags against the wall. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

* * *

Jon doesn’t look good. There’s a weird feeling behind Elias’s eyes as he peers at him, accompanied by a sudden realization that Elias still has Jonah Magnus’s crusty old eyes resting in his sockets. The bastard’s spirit is gone, but some of his power lingers.

“Oh, no,” Elias whispers. “No, no, no, no. _Fuck!”_

“What is it?” Sasha asks.

Elias steps forward. “I know what I have to do.”

And he hates it. Despises it. Elias was never privy to whatever the hell Jonah saw with his freaky Eye powers before, and he was fucking glad. Being a captive audience was bad enough without an added peep show, and all the time Jonah spent zoned out with his sights set elsewhere gave Elias the space he needed to keep from completely losing it over the years.

Now the Ceaseless Watcher is charging him rent for being in his own goddamn head. It’s not fair.

“Well?” Tim asks, reminding Elias he’s been staring hard at Jon this entire time. “What?”

Elias sighs heavily. “It’s hard to explain. Just stand back and watch, okay? And don’t pull us apart, no matter how weird it looks.”

Ignoring their protests and demands for further explanation—there’s no way he could put it into words if he tried, not even with the benefit of all his stolen knowledge—Elias reaches out and puts his hand on Jon’s forehead.

Everything goes green. Elias really grew to hate that color over the years. Jonah wasn’t subtle about his allegiance—the eye decorations and wardrobe choices all screamed Beholding’s Bitch.

And now here they are—Elias and Jon, trapped together.

Elias looks how he remembers himself in the mindscape—young, only nominally dressed for the job. It wasn’t like anybody really cared with file clerks. Jon is just Jon. He looks confused at seeing a younger Elias standing before him in a blank void. Understanding hits Jon like a brick before he can voice any of the questions he wants to ask. He staggers backwards. 

Elias feels sorry for him.

“No!” Jon puts a hand to his head. There are eyes opening on his face, his arms, his hand—and all are glowing. “We can’t just switch places!”

“We don’t get a say in it.” Elias puts his hands in his pockets. Goddamn, he missed jeans. “I’m apparently not worthy to hold all the keys to the kingdom. Sorry, mate.”

Jon clutches his head with both hands. “I don’t want them!”

“And I don’t want your crap job, either,” Elias agrees. “But I’ve been mired in all this too long, so now I know too much.”

He steps forward. Reaching out with an arm that’s also covered in eyes. “So I guess all I can do is stay and help you out.”

Jon takes his hand.

They come to back in the office. Jon is crying. Elias is crying. Their only visible eyes are the real ones for now. Small mercy, because the others are freaked out enough at witnessing Beholding’s bootleg mind meld. 

“Yeah,” Elias says when Jon looks at him in reality, knowing he feels just as bolstered by their combined fear. “It’s complete and utter horse shit, I know. I really fuckin’ hate how much I soddin’ know right now, believe you me.”

Tim bursts in helpless laughter—it starts with a little chuckle and builds until he’s clutching Sasha and crying as he laughs. Elias’s cursing over the situation finally broke him. 

Sasha rubs Tim’s back and whispers, “I know.”

That’s how Martin finds them when he returns with a tea tray. He tightens his grip on it. “What the heck happened?”

Sasha glares at Elias and Jon. “That’s what I’d like to know.”

It’s funny how quickly a word or phrase can start to lose all meaning the more it’s spoken in quick succession. If Tim can be reduced to hysterical laughter just hearing his formerly posh boss dropping the f-bomb, Elias is about to start screaming if he hears ‘I know’ one more time—and that includes if he says it truthfully.

Tim takes his personal mug off the tray with a trembling hand. 

“Sorry,” he says, sniffling. “But between Die Hard, the Vulcan mind meld, and everything else that’s happened today, that little bout of cursing was just too much.”

Elias bites his tongue.

“Mind meld?” Martin looks to Jon, finally registering that he’s no longer catatonic. “You’re back!”

“Yes.” Jon gives a tired wave from across the desk. “Hello, Martin.”

There’s no running to him with tea tray in hand, so Martin settles for presenting him with his mug like a conquering hero. He turns and gives Elias a mug—it’s one of the spares, as usual—as an afterthought. Elias is just grateful to have something to drink. A taste like acid is lingering on his tongue from Jonah Magnus’s banishment, and it’s good to finally wash it away even if he scorches his palate in the process. Martin even remembered Elias likes his tea sweet—his taste in tea never changed despite being possessed.

“So, then,” Elias mutters into his embarrassing charity shop mug. He glances to Jon, who’s staring into his own tea like it has all the answers. “Explanations are in order, aren’t they?”

“You’re damn right they are,” Tim grumbles.

“Before he—”Sasha gestures vaguely with her free hand. “Checked out, Jon said, ‘Jonah Magnus is gone, only Elias Bouchard remains. Do not let him leave.’ Which was a very Exorcist thing to say.”

“Really?” Tim interjects. “I’m thinking more Ghostbusters, personally. I half expected Jon to start levitating for a moment there.”

“There was levitating in the Exorcist, too? wasn’t there?” Elias asks, doubting his memory a little.

“Everyone just shut up about movies!” Martin snaps, before recoiling and looking embarrassed at his own outburst.

Jon nods his approval, making Martin blush. 

“Anyway,” Elias sighs. “It’s like this: Jonah Magnus did this thing where he cheated death for centuries by popping out his eyes and transferring them to other bodies. I was the latest victim of the whole process.”

He pauses to let that sink in and have another sip of tea. Everyone stares at him in horror.

“Then your eyes...” Sasha says, leaning closer.

“Are still the geezer’s, yeah.” Elias nods. “No idea what he did with mine. Doesn’t matter. His spirit’s gone, I’m back in control of my body.”

“But the Eye doesn’t particularly like Elias,” Jon says, sounding bitter. “Not as much as it does _me_ , anyway.”

“The what?” Martin asks. The others look just as confused.

Elias laughs a little. He’s far too sober for this shit.

“The Eye. It’s the Entity the Institute serves,” he says. “The motto on the crest? _Audio, vigilo, opperior?_ Means I listen, I watch, I wait. Too fucking obvious, when you think about it. And it’s got other names, too. The Ceaseless Watcher. Beholding. It Knows You.” He rolls his eyes. “All Fourteen Fears have lots of names. The Eye is the fear of being watched—again, bit obvious—and we all work for it, unfortunately.”

Everyone except Jon, who’s still staring into his mug, stares as Elias takes another sip of tea and wishes it was spiked with something with a high proof. There’s very expensive bourbon in the liquor cabinet upstairs, but he can’t very well excuse himself now.

The assistants all start talking at once, asking too many questions—what does he mean Fear Entities, what are the others, what about Jon. And then inevitably Tim tries to ask why can’t they just quit, which leads to the revelation the contracts Jonah had them sign are apparently still binding, which leads to more yelling, until at last Jon stands up.

“ _Everyone be quiet!”_

Dead silence. Everyone goes still. He has the real power now, Elias knows, but not even Jon realizes the full extent of that power yet.

“There’s one surefire way to quit,” Elias says. “But it’s not pleasant.” He points to his eyes and makes a popping sound as he mimes gouging them out with a thumb. “It also means the Watcher can never see through you again, cause there’s nothing to see. You’re totally free that way.”

Looks of revulsion ripple through his captive audience. Even Jon looks unnerved as he collapses back into his chair with an expression of utter defeat.

“Yeah,” Elias says, finishing off his tea. “Not many people take the out.”

“So that’s it?” Tim looks like he wants to punch something. “We’re just stuck here?”

“Til death or blindness.” Elias raises his empty mug in a wry toast. “But on the bright side, Jonah Magnus isn’t around actively plotting to usher in the apocalypse via the Watcher’s Crown, so at least there’s that.”

That latest bombshell earns him a fresh round of stunned silence.

It’s Sasha who breaks it. “He was _what?”_

“That was where the ‘I wait’ part of the Institute’s motto comes in.” Elias gestures to Jon. “You were always destined to surpass the old man in power, so in a way, I guess it still came true... just without the world ending.”

“Alright.” Jon narrows his eyes. “Seeing as you’re so much more well informed than the rest of us, what _exactly_ are we supposed to do now?”

Elias shrugs. “I don’t know about you lot, but I could use a drink or twenty.”

“ _Great_ idea!” Tim cries, up from his seat in an instant. He’s extremely keen to flee the crash course in how fucked they all are, and Elias can’t blame him.

“But it’s the middle of the day!” Martin protests.

Sasha puts a hand on his shoulder. “Think about what we just talked about.”

“Good point.” Martin looks to Jon. “Are you coming?”

Jon still looks perturbed. 

“I’ll follow along shortly,” he says. “I need to speak with Elias first.”

“Try not to kill each other!” Tim calls, his good cheer renewed by the mere prospect of abandoning work mid-shift for drinks.

“For fuck’s sake, this isn’t Highlander!” Elias yells back. Within moments the others are gone, all too eager to ditch work now that they know the truth.

Jon just stares blankly at him, not getting the movie reference.

Elias sighs. “We should have a movie night or something. I’m way behind now. Anyway, what’s up?”

“How can you be so bloody calm?!” Jon exclaims.

“Calm?” Elias laughs harshly. “ _Calm?!_ Mate, literally the only thing between me and a nervous breakdown right now is the promise of drinking myself into oblivion. So if that’s all you’ve got to ask...” He starts backing towards the door, arms outstretched to give Jon a chance to say something else.

Jon’s eyes flash, literally flash that shade and of green Elias has only seen reflected off the walls and terrified faces, and Elias knows he’s reading him like a damn book in that moment. Most people explain it away when they see it, but he knows better. Goddamn, but he misses the good old days, the clueless stoner Elias days.

“Of course,” Jon sneers. “You never had healthy coping strategies before, did you?”

“Don’t you dare fucking Behold me!” Elias snaps, pointing an accusatory finger at Jon. “I haven’t had control of my body in decades! If I wanna celebrate having it back by getting absolutely wrecked, that’s _my_ bloody choice!”

Jon folds his arms. “You _do_ realize you’re too old for this sort of behavior, don’t you? Your body can’t handle it, for one thing.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Elias rolls his eyes. “And despite what you put on your resume, you’re only twenty-eight, not thirty-eight, so stuff it about what’s age appropriate, Jon.”

It hits Elias that he was younger by three years and suffering a mild quarter life crisis when he had his eyes scooped out in the Panopticon. Jon’s eyes widen as he becomes aware of the very same fact. Elias sees the horror reflected as Jon feels what it was like to be trapped inside his own mind, growing older while someone else lived his life, turning ‘Elias Bouchard’ into a completely different person. 

It’s strangely gratifying to witness.

Elias turns and flees the Archives just as Jon’s expression starts to soften around the edges. The last thing he needs right now is anyone’s pity, least of all a fellow sacrificial lamb like Jon. All Elias wants is to drink until he can’t remember his name, age, or address, mainly because every goddamn thing on his ID haunts him. The smug old bastard in the picture isn’t really him, not that anyone is going to card him these days. 

Great, Elias skipped from his quarter-life crisis, afraid of where he’d be when he hit thirty, and went directly to his mid-life crisis, finding himself a recovering victim of body theft and Archivist by default thanks to Jon’s promotion to whatever the hell Jonah counted as in Beholding’s books. Elias never understood the hierarchy and didn’t care to, but they were probably both avatars of some sort. 

_Shit_. 

He’s going to need to explain that before Jon gets the itch to feed, which means being at least a little responsible and holding back on the drinking so Jon doesn’t accidentally compel someone into spilling their most horrific life experience over drinks. It was as much for everyone else’s sake as it was Jon’s.

Elias stops outside the side entrance, knowing Jon always came the same way.

Except he doesn’t. Not this time.

“Motherfucker,” Elias hisses under his breath, running down the alley and around the corner until he spots Jon walking down the street. Elias is lucky Jonah kept his body fit enough for a burst of sprinting, making it easy to catch up to Jon as he walks at a brisk clip. Elias grabs his shoulder and spins him around. Jon looks surprised that he bothered to run to catch up.

“Don’t fucking do that!” Elias snaps.

“Do what?”

“Peek ahead to see where I am and detour around, you wanker!” Elias clenches his fist. “That is such a goddamn Jonah Magnus thing to do!”

He might as well have punched Jon in the gut outright for all the harm the words do to him.

“I... I didn’t realize what I was doing...” Jon stammers. “I only thought I should perhaps give you some space, and the next think I knew I caught a glimpse outside the side entrance.”

“There’s an eye carved above the door,” Elias says, measuring the words carefully as he tries to rein in his anger. “You have all his abilities now, so you must have looked through it subconsciously. He could see through any eye, including facsimiles.”

That’s such a weird word, facsimiles. Goddamn secondhand vocabulary strikes again.

“I never even paid attention to it,” Jon says, mystified.

“Yeah, that’s the point,” Elias sighs, running a hand through his hair. It’s still a mess. “Once you start paying attention to how many eyes are hidden around the Institute just so Mags could spy on people, it’s... well, like I said, I need a drink.”

“I really didn’t mean to do it,” Jon says in dismay. “I just didn’t want to seem like I was chasing you.”

“And yet I ended up chasing you.” Elias utters a short, rueful laugh. He takes Jon by the arm as they start walking. “But speaking of accidentally using powers, there’s something you need to know...”

By the time they get to the Cat’s Eye, the Institute’s favorite dingy little watering hole, they both desperately need a drink. The others are already way ahead of them there.


	2. Cheers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And now for Jon’s point of view.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is all a grand experiment in longer chapters and shifting perspectives, so things are gonna ramble a bit.
> 
> cw: heavy drinking, weed references

The Cat’s Eye has the atmosphere of an old cop bar, complete with old group photos of Institute staff all along the walls, just in case there was any doubt who frequented the place. The mood is alternately quiet and grim or far too raucous—it depends on which departments are there, the occasion, and what round they’re on. Jon’s never known ‘civilians’ to wander in off the street. He personally walked by it three times the first night he was invited out, given the entrance is tucked away in a recessed alcove and down a small flight of stairs. You have to know what you’re looking for, and it’s not just a sign with an evil-eyed cat.

On busy nights inside, if the people present aren’t staring in silence and drinking themselves into a stupor, they’re loudly slagging off their fellow intrepid employees. Any fights that break out are inevitably because someone from one department started talking shit in the presence of another—unknowingly or otherwise. 

Jon isn’t particularly fond of the Cat’s Eye—in fact, he rather hates pubs in general—but he’s reluctantly gone along with the others in the name of ‘team building’ on multiple occasions. Now that he thinks about it, that was Elias’s suggestion—the old Elias, the one who was secretly Jonah Magnus. What was he playing at, anyway? Beholding offers no insight into the motivations on the dearly departed, alas.

It’s so early in the day the Archives staff are the only ones around to drag the gloomy atmosphere down. Sasha, Tim, and Martin have claimed the usual booth, and they’re well ahead of Jon and Elias as far as drinking and brooding on their situation is concerned.

Martin waves with far more enthusiasm than seems necessary when he sees them enter, but Jon can’t help but feel hesitant to join them just yet. He makes for the bar under pretense of ordering drinks first, Elias following close at his heels.

“We have to tell them,” Jon says, bracing himself on the bar. “About... what I—er, what we can do. As a warning. They deserve to know.”

“Drinks first,” Elias replies.

Jon wishes they had the buffer of the after work crowd surrounding them. It’s too quiet. The bartender doesn’t comment on why they’re about so early—he never asks questions, it’s why the place is the Institute’s de facto haunt—and once he serves their drinks he goes back to reading the newspaper.

Jon feels vaguely guilty he never bothered to ask the bartender’s name before, but he doesn’t need to—it’s Oscar. He’s seventy-three and has no plans of ever retiring. Oscar also knows exactly what the Institute is all about, it’s hard not to given all the things he overhears, he simply doesn’t give a toss. He spends all his spare time making silent stop motion animation films of Agatha Christie mysteries that he’s too self-conscious to show anyone. He’s finished two thus far, and at this rate they may only be discovered upon his death. Jon raises his glass with a trembling hand, not sure how to deal with the onslaught of information. Beer spills down his chin as he attempts to drink.

“Trouble?”

Of course Elias doesn’t ask if Jon’s okay, because he already knows the answer is no.

“It’s not a basement full of bodies, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Funny.” Elias throws back his shot of whiskey and winces. “Actually, that reminds me of something else I need to tell you.

“Dear lord...”

“Well, it’s not bodies plural, but... hold on.” Elias waves the bartender back over. “Can you just leave the bottle? Cheers.”

Jon gives him a side-long glare. “You should really pace yourself.”

“And you should shut it,” Elias replies as he pours himself another oversized shot. “Because it’s not fuckin’ easy talking about Gertrude Robinson.”

“What about her?”

Elias gestures Jon wait as he throws back the shot in one practiced motion. He slams the glass down and immediately starts pouring again. “She’s under the Institute.”

“Oh.” Jon slowly raises his glass and takes a long sip. He doesn’t relish the taste. “I see. But isn’t she—”

“Yeah. Very much so.”

“Did—”

“Yeah, with a shotgun.”

“And then he just—”

“All alone to rot, yeah.”

Jon takes another sip of his beer. “Sorry, but should we be talking about this here? Right at the bar? With—”

“Oscar doesn’t care,” Elias says, a gleam in his stolen eyes. “Do you, Oz?”

“Nah.” Oscar rustles the newspaper and licks his finger to turn the page, all without ever looking up. The brim of his flat cap leaves his wrinkled old eyes in shadow. “What you say ain’t half as bad as what them Artifact blokes get to grousin’ about some nights ‘fore I gotta cut ‘em off. None of my business, anyhow.”

Jon can’t imagine what’s worse than cold-blooded murder—doesn’t even want to—and he takes another long sip of beer before his imagination or Beholding can go there. He glances back to Elias just as he finishes another shot.

“Wait, did you just—”

“Yeah.”

Jon puts his glass down. “Alright, I’ve had quite enough of that!”

Elias blinks at him. “What?”

“You answering me before I can even finish asking a bloody question!”

Elias looks genuinely confused. “Wait, you didn’t? I could swear...”

Sasha clears her throat. “Um, yes, hi, I hate to interrupt, buuuut...”

Sasha indeed hates to interrupt, because she and the others drew lots to see who would go over, and she lost. 

Jon and Elias both look over as Sasha thumbs over her shoulder at the booth. Martin smiles and waves with much more restraint than before, looking very timid about it this go around. Tim, meanwhile, is hunched over the table and staring very intently at his latest half-empty beer glass.

“Are you two joining us or what?”

“Of course!” Elias stands and sways dangerously. Jon reaches out to steady him automatically.

“I told you to pace yourself,” Jon chides. “You didn’t even eat lunch.”

Jon shouldn’t know that. This is quickly getting annoying. His mind is like a pool of now fathomless water, thoughts roiling even more than usual, and there’s no telling what little tidbit of information—useful or otherwise—will bob to the surface next.

“ _He_ skipped lunch,” Elias sneers, smacking Jon’s hand away. “So focused on his damn spreadsheets he didn’t notice whatever took him. Ironic, innit?”

Elias takes two unsteady steps in the wrong direction, moving away from the booth. Sasha raises a tentative hand, almost says something, but thinks better of it. Hard not to be hesitant to correct your boss. Hell, it’s hard to stop thinking of Elias as the boss, even when he looks a mess and the rapid fire shots of whiskey are taking their toll. He’s still older than all of them by a good margin, after all, but it isn’t as though he really got to live through the past twenty years. Jon can’t let himself forget that, though every time he looks at Elias there’s a severe disconnect between the coldly professional superior he used to look up to—who, it turned out, was a centuries old monster—and this disheveled mess before him.

“Anyway, I’m fine,” Elias declares. “Totally fine.”

He’s not fine.

Jon points to the bathroom. Elias runs for it.

Sasha is left standing awkwardly by the bar while Jon finishes his beer and gestures to the bartender.

“Just a water for the both of us next, please.”

“Do you think he’ll be alright?” Sasha asks as Jon follows her to the booth with a glass in each hand.

Tim looks up with bleary eyes at Jon’s arrival. He grins at the waters. “Giving up already?”

Jon passes one of the glasses to him. ”Ye gods, did you learn nothing at uni?”

Never mind that it was Georgie that taught him the importance of fighting off the dehydration that heavy alcohol consumption brought on.

Tim takes the glass and presses it to his forehead rather than take a sip. Martin, meanwhile, is struggling to fish the maraschino cherry out of the ice in his highball glass.

“Don’t go anywhere,” Jon says. “We still need to talk. But first I need to deal with Elias.”

Martin gasps and drops the cherry. “You don’t mean...” He mimes slitting his throat.

“ _No_ , Martin,” Jon groans. “This isn’t the bloody mafia.”

Tim, picking the worst possible moment to start drinking his water, swallows wrong as he snorts with laughter.

“Martin!” Sasha, aghast, glares at Martin as she pounds on Tim’s back to try and get him to stop coughing. “Why on earth would you even think that?”

“Look, it’s been a very weird day, alright?!” Martin yells. “Everything is changing and I don’t have any idea how this is supposed to work!”

“No one does!” Sasha hits Tim’s back a little too hard for emphasis. He doubles over onto the table, knocking several glasses over in the process.

All the noise and confusion gives Jon the perfect opportunity to slip back to the bathroom. Tim has mostly stopped coughing by the time he reaches the door, allowing Jon to focus on the sounds on the other side. 

The toilet flushes. 

Jon waits.

It’s growing quiet on both sides.

He glances back at the booth. Oscar the bartender is dealing with the mess made of the table while the others apologize profusely and make things worse by awkwardly trying to help.

Jon turns back to the door, half expecting Elias to step out and barrel into him. He doesn’t. He wonders what the hell he’s doing in there.

Suddenly Jon is peering down at an awkward angle on the men’s rooms’ only stall. Elias is sitting against the weathered wooded partition with his legs stretched out in front of him on the floor. There are tears in his eyes.

“Hello, Jon,” Elias mutters, not looking up. “You might as well come in.”

Jon blinks and staggers backwards, feeling as though he just fell several feet. He steps inside. The men’s room is about as clean as one could expect of a pub—which is to say, it’s disgusting. The wooden divider offers a modicum of privacy from the row of urinals, but there’s no actual door. As Jon rounds the corner, he realizes he was peeking through the eyes of an old band flyer pasted high on the wall.

“How did you know?” Jon asks.

Elias pulls his legs up so he can rest his arms on his knees. “Somebody once told me—told _him_ , I mean—you feel it on the back of your neck.” He stares hard at his manicured nails. “Most people are just so used to the feeling of being watched these days that they ignore it.”

Jon thinks about that feeling he got in his office sometimes—of that particular skin crawling sensation that lingered as he recorded post-statement commentary. It scared him enough to make him lie, act as though he was a dyed-in-the-wool skeptic who believed none of what he was reading, but still he worried that it—that Jonah Magnus, apparently—knew Jon was _really_ frightened.

“Yeah,” Elias says. “He was just waiting to see how long before you broke and dropped the act.”

Jon holds the glass of water out, his hand shaking worse than ever at the news. It’s all he can do not to splash it in Elias’s face instead.

“Drink this—and _please_ , for the love of god, stop doing that.”

“Right. Sorry. I’ll do my best.”

Elias takes the glass with both hands. He stares at it a moment before turning a weak smile up at Jon. “Bit unsanitary, bringing a drink into the loo, don’t you think?”

Jon can’t help but laugh. “Just don’t refill it from the toilet and you’ll be fine.”

“Thanks.” 

Elias takes a slow sip of water, wincing at the cold.

Jon leans against the advert plastered wall and folds his arms, unable to stoop to joining Elias down on the grimy tile floor. Elias catches Jon’s look of disgust as he considers it and smirks. “I’m gonna burn all his clothes anyway, so I figure I might as well roll around in filth.”

“Yes, and then what are you going to wear?”

“Ah.” Elias snaps his fingers. “I may have gotten too excited by the prospect of burning everything to think past that.”

“You—er, he has a nice Georgian townhouse, doesn’t he? Don’t tell me you’re torching that as well?”

“Maybe. I fucking hate that place,” Elias spits. “It’s like a museum, not a place anybody actually lives.”

“We could clear it out,” Jon says, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “Sell everything off—including the house itself.”

“You’d help me do that?”

“You helped me out of... whatever that was earlier,” Jon says. “Seems the least I could do. The others will be morbidly curious to see the inside as well.”

“It’s not quite a gothic horror show, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Not me, no.”

Elias sighs heavily and hands the glass back before standing. “But they do.”

“There’s been some open speculation, yes.” Jon points to the sink. “Now go wash up.”

“Once again, you’re half my age, Jon.”

“And you’re an absolute mess.” Jon shoos Elias toward the sink. “Go on.”

Elias hesitates as he rounds the corner and is greeted by his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Jon peers around the partition only after Elias stalks forward, his hands bunched with determination as he stares himself down. Jon has no idea what’s going through his head as he washes his hands, and he’s glad. Elias finishes by splashing water on his face and stands up. He rakes his hands through his hair, succeeding only in making more of a mess of it, and scowls at the mirror.

“Please tell me you’re not going to punch it,” Jon sighs.

“Don’t be daft,” Elias snaps. “Not when I just got my body back.”

He pulls at a lock of hair again and it springs right back into place. “It’s this crap he put in my hair, see? It’s like fucking glue.”

Jon moves closer. “Then wash it out.”

“Seriously?” Elias double takes. “Here? Now? In a pub bathroom sink?”

“Don’t try and pretend you have any dignity left after throwing up all that whiskey.”

“Oh, please.” Elias grins and gestures at his legs. “I’ve still got pants on.”

Jon still can’t get used to Elias joking. Or smiling. It feels wrong. Nevertheless, he chuckles.

“Here.” Jon rolls up his sleeves. “If you’re not opposed, I can try and get the worst of it out with soap and water.”

Elias shrugs and turns back to the sink. “Good fucking luck, mate.”

It’s not as easy a task as Jon thought, but whatever unholy mix of chemicals Jonah Magnus called hair gel is finally starting to break apart when the bathroom door opens and a Martin walks in—catching Jon and Elias bent over the sink. The act of shampooing could indeed look rather sensuous without the vital context of Jon’s muttered cursing and Elias whining that he keeps pulling his hair.

Martin, of course, assumes the worst and runs out. Jon can’t leave it like that. Not that he particularly cares what Martin thinks—he just can’t have him thinking he and _Elias_ are a thing.

“Martin, wait!” 

Jon leaves Elias to awkwardly dry off using paper towels and runs after Martin, who disappears down the back hall and through the side exit. The door leads to a dead end that is most definitely a fire hazard, but that’s something to discuss with Oscar later. For now, Jon comes to a stop by the hastily erected fence that Martin is kicking while sobbing.

Jon doesn’t say anything, he just lets Martin work out his frustration before slowly coming to the realization that Jon is standing right behind him.

“Oh.” Martin sniffles and glares at Jon. “Come to rub it in?”

“Why would I—“ Jon shakes his head and tries again. “I was worried you got the wrong idea.”

“Yeah?” Martin utters something closer to a fresh sob than a laugh. “What’s not to get, Jon? You and Elias are clearly very close now. I’m only sorry I interrupted!”

Jon covers his face with his palm. “It’s not like that, Martin. We share a common affliction. It’s not... he’s twice my age, for god’s sake! I was trying to help wash the off last vestiges of Jonah Magnus and his awful hair gel, nothing more.”

Martin still doesn’t look convinced.

Jon sighs. “Martin, please. Literally the only thing we have in common is this...” He points to his eye, not sure if there’s any visible change, but it suffices as an illustration regardless. “Beholding’s sodding awful blessing.”

Martin leans forward to peer at him curiously, not seeming to notice anything outwardly different. For that, Jon is glad. 

“But it chose you, didn’t it?” Martin folds his arms. “Seems like it’d be a pretty sweet deal.”

“You’d think!” Jon’s laugh sounds a little too unhinged for his liking. He needs rest, not drinks. “But no, I keep getting bombarded with information I neither want or need to know—things that barely have any relevance to anything, things like...“

Martin has been hopelessly in love with Jon since the day he met him. The sudden knowledge is like a blow to the gut.

“The Eye’s twisted idea of fun facts.” Jon’s afraid the way his voice becomes strangled gives away that fact he knows about Martin’s crush on him. Or maybe it’s the way his eyes go wide that does it.

“What?” Martin looks concerned. “What‘s wrong?” 

“Nothing.” Jon turns away. “Never mind.”

But his voice gives too much away.

“Oh god!” Martin crowds into his personal space. “What did you see?!”

“Nothing!”

“It’s about my CV, isn’t it?”

Jon turns back to Martin, completely caught off guard. He’s too close. “Your what?”

Jon’s genuine shock makes Martin realize he’s gravely miscalculated. His face goes red as he steps back.

“CDs.” Martin moves toward the side door. “I said CDs. I downloaded and burned a lot of music illegally back in the day. It’s my greatest shame.”

That’s not what he said and that’s not his greatest shame by far, but Jon just stares at Martin in silence rather than call him on it.

“Okay, then!” Martin pulls the door open. “Glad we cleared all that up, aren’t you? Anyway, the others are probably getting impatient!”

“Right...”

Jon follows him back inside. No sense pressing him about it. Not when the others are indeed still waiting. It’s Elias who waves when they return, his hair still damp but tousled into something that at least looks acceptable. Tim and Sasha helped, after a bit of arguing about what looked best.

“You two work things out?” Tim asks, with a wink aimed at Martin, and suddenly its apparent that everyone but Jon knew about his little crush. Jon looks to Elias, who steals Tim’s water and takes a large sip, confirming that even he knew about it. Feeling like a fool, Jon veers away from the booth to place an order at the bar—alone. 

“An old fashioned, please.”

And then, horror of horrors, Oscar tips his hat up so he can look Jon in the eye. “This the celebratin’ kind or the commiseratin’ kind?”

Jon slams his hands on the bar. “It’s the how the bloody hell does everybody know my business better than I do kind!”

“Mmm-hmm, generous pour, then?”

“Yes, please,” Jon sighs, slumping forward while Oscar gets out a fresh glass. “Extra cherries, too.”

“Suppose I shouldn’t bother muddlin’ ‘em, neither.”

Jon glares. “I thought you said—”

Oscar pulls his cap back down over his eyes. “Just cause it ain’t none of my business don’t mean I don’t pay attention, guv.” He starts adding far too many cherries to the glass. “The difference is what I hear never leaves these walls.”

Jon nods slowly. “It’ll be faster this way, I suppose. Though hardly a proper old fashioned.”

“Drink’s a drink.” Oscar slides the glass over. “Enjoy.”

Jon nods his thanks and walks back to the booth, where forces—that is, everyone else—have conspired to to get him to sit next to Martin.

“The tab is going to be ghastly,” Jon mutters.

“Relax.” Elias smirks and folds his arms behind his head. “You’re drinking with the boss.”

“Damn it!” Tim smacks his forehead. “Knew I shoulda got the good stuff earlier!”

Sasha stands up. “Let’s go!”

While Tim and Sasha hurry to correct their earlier drink choices, Jon slides his drink over to Martin, who looks confused.

“Oh, um, I’m not much of a bourbon drinker.”

“The cherries,” Jon says. “You can pick them out first. I noticed you having trouble with one earlier, so... have at it before they sink.”

Martin practically blushes as red as the cherries themselves. “Thanks.”

While Martin uses the cocktail straws to spear them, Jon turns his attention to Elias, who’s pointedly staring at the ceiling.

“Better wait til Tim and Sasha get back,” he says. “Then we can have our little chat.”

Jon scowls. “At this rate I’m the only one who’s going to remember this conversation.”

“I’ve only had two drinks,” Martin protests, waving the straw of skewered cherries at Jon before returning his glass of mostly bourbon. Oscar was perhaps too generous with the pour. Jon stabs at the orange slice with a frown as Tim and Sasha take their seats once again.

“So, what’s up?” Sasha asks.

Tim takes a large sip of his drink. “Is this about your spooky new powers?”

Jon glares at Elias. “You already told them?!”

“It might have slipped out.”

Martin plucks a cherry off the straw, looking nervous. “Spooky in what sense?”

Jon pinches the bridge of his nose. “Please stop saying ‘spooky’.”

“I dunno,” Tim retorts, grinning. “It all sounds very spooky.”

Jon glares at Tim. “And what happened to your brother, Tim? Was that ‘spooky’?”

The words are out of Jon’s mouth before he realizes exactly what he’s saying. The air around the booth turns frigid. Tim’s expression is murderous. Jon has made a terrible mistake.

Elias snaps his fingers, breaking the tension so suddenly half the table tenses.

“I just remembered something,” he declares. “It’s kind of a funny story, actually.”

Everyone looks doubtful—Tim most of all. 

“Oh, come on,” Elias says. “Aren’t you the least bit interested about how things were during Gertrude’s tenure? Back when she had assistants, even?”

That piques everyone’s interest. They only knew her toward the end, when she was a one woman Head Archivist.

“Fine.” Tim sits back and crosses his arms, still glaring at Jon. “Go on, then. But this better be good.”

Elias clears his throat theatrically. “Okay, so, this was... a while ago. Dates are fuzzy. I was still in full control of myself, that’s the important part, so still the 90’s. I was in a broom closet teaching Micheal, Gertrude’s newest assistant, how to shotgun smoke weed when—“

“So in other words,” Sasha butts in. “You were practically kissing.”

“Well, yes, but anyway.”

Tim is grinning maniacally. He catches Martin’s hopelessly lost looks and helpfully explains. “It’s when you hold smoke in your mouth, lean really close to the other person, and then blow it into their open mouth.”

“Honestly, why not just make out?” Sasha chuckles.

Elias glares at her. “Do you want to hear this story or not?”

“Sorry, sorry.” Sasha bows to him as much as the table will allow. “So you and this Michael had a thing going under the pretense of smoking weed together. And then—?”

“Something from Artifact Storage broke containment and made it’s way into the Archives,” Elias continues. “We stepped outside to see what all the commotion was about, and there was this... inky blob thing flailing all over the place, changing shape whenever it got near any one person.”

“I’m sorry,” Jon says. “Inky blob thing? Really?”

“This isn’t a statement,” Elias snaps. “I don’t have to call it an amorphous mass of writhing darkness if I don’t feel like it. Anyway, it went for some poor sod who was there for a statement and suddenly it’s all legs. Bloke screamed bloody murder and bolted. Gertrude yelled to corner it, but how the hell were we supposed to do that? It turned on me and leapt at my fucking face before I could even think of what to do, covering my eyes and nose. I still had my mouth uncovered to breathe, but it was so dark and cold and constricting all I could do was scream.”

“Good lord,” Jon whispers.

“I thought my skull was being crushed. It only lasted a few seconds, but it felt like ages. Being high really did not help there.” Elias laughs and shakes his head. “But then somebody pulled it off and threw it to the ground. It was Michael. He saved me. Weirdest thing happened after that.”

“What?” Martin leans closer.

Elias scratches his chin. “Maybe the weed hit him different, made him extra chill, I don’t know, but it was like the thing didn’t know what to do with him. The form it ended up settling looked a lot like a fluffy black kitten. I thought I was losing it, especially when Michael laughed and poked it. I mean, he was stoned, he didn’t get the danger—but I was just as high and I still got that thing was extremely unnatural. How could he not see it? I was trying to call his attention to it when Gertrude swooped in and took care of it herself. 

“That was the day I realized that no matter what sort of freaky shit happened around the Archives, no matter how obviously wrong it was, Michael was somehow immune. I never got the chance to figure out why that was before I got claimed by that weird bullshit myself. Woulda been easier if I just died, then I wouldn’t have had to see him every day until his luck finally ran out. He was the last of Gertrude’s assistants to go.”

Everyone stares at Elias as he trails off into silence, his story evidently finished.

“I’m sorry,” Sasha says. “How is that funny?”

“Oh.” Elias looks up. “He adopted a cat after that. Inspired by that thing, apparently. Her name was the Grand Duchess. Gertrude inherited her after his... uh, disappearance, but she was already pretty old for a cat by then. Died of natural causes not long after. If I wasn’t... y’know... I would’ve taken her in myself. Gertrude kept her in her office and she hated m—I mean Jonah Magnus. Cats can always tell, I guess.”

“What was even the point of that story?” Tim demands. “That weird shit happens around the Institute all the time and every archival assistant inevitably dies?!”

“That was how it used to be,” Elias says, fixing a meaningful look on Jon. “But we have the power to change things now.”

Jon stares at Elias. “Where do we even begin?”

Elias rubs the back of his neck. “That’s probably a discussion best saved for later.” He looks around the table. “When we’re all more sober.”

“I say we just burn down the fuckin’ Institute,” Tim mutters, head down on the table. “Boom. Problem solved.”

“See?” Elias says, pointing. “Case in point.”

“Burning it down?” Martin asks. “Or waiting?”

“Waiting,” Jon says. “But we’ll leave burning it down as a last ditch option.”

Sasha raises her glass in a toast. “Hurray for arson.”

“No one’s necessarily burning anything right away,” Jon retorts.

“Except these clothes,” Elias says, pulling at the collar at his shirt.

“Again, you need replacements before you can do that.”

Tim raises a hand. “I’ve got stuff I was gonna toss anyway.”

“Ooh!” Martin claps his hands together excitedly. “It’ll be just like queer eye!”

“It always comes back to eyes,” Jon sighs. “Funny, that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should be working on other things but no, my brain wants to focus on this. I guess it’s a matter of rotating my creative crops to keep things fresh. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!

**Author's Note:**

> I decided, after wrestling with how the hell to continue after chapter two, to go back and rewrite this first chapter and start over, scrapping the whole Archivist angle and focus more heavily on Elias and Michael. I like the interactions between the archives Crew so I’m keeping this here for posterity.


End file.
